The World Affairs Council of Connecticut hosted a conversation on radical Islam, including the Islamic State and Boko Haram, at the Mark Twain House in Hartford on March 26.

The moderator was Dr. Heidi Hadsell, president of the Hartford Seminary and professor of social ethics, and panelists were Dr. Okey Ndibe, professor of African and African diaspora literatures at Brown University, and Dr. Saud Anwar, a physician specializing in lung diseases and critical care medicine and chair of the Department of Internal Medicine at Manchester Memorial Hospital and Rockville General Hospital. Anwar is also the current mayor of South Windsor – the first Muslim mayor in Connecticut – and founded the American-Muslim Peace Initiative.

Ndibe is also an expert on Boko Haram – an Islamist terrorist movement based in north-east Nigeria, also active in Chad, Niger and northern Cameroon.

Anwar spoke primarily about the Islamic State and radicalism in general, and said that American actions often help recruitment for extremists.

"Whenever we say that there are 'Islamic terrorists,' their actions actually get legitimacy," he said. "We don't realize that in the war in Iraq, more than one million people died – one million Muslims who lived in that area have died. Our media does not discuss those things. There are real, legitimate reasons why [Muslim] people are upset."

There is, Anwar said, a role for moderate Muslims to play against the extremists.

"As soon as a religion card is played, it becomes a very complex issue," he said. "The only thing that can actually trump that card is a religion card. What that means is that if someone is going to use religion to justify violence, hatred [or] anger towards any other being, then it has to be the people of that faith who stand up and [change] the minds of those individuals, based on the texts and the facts of the faith itself."

Also not depicted often in American media is the fact that Muslims are fighting Muslim extremists, he said. "The extremists that are out there, the number one group of people they are murdering are Muslims," Anwar said. "The number one group of people that are fighting these extremists out there are Muslims. The moderate voice is at war with these people and are fighting for their lives."

But, the panelists said, there is also a role for the rest of the world: not buying into the "us vs. them" mentality.

"The media in this country and elsewhere frequently [subscribes] to this binary conception of news – that there are the good guys and bad guys and nothing in between," Ndibe said. "That kind of narrative then feeds a particular kind of mild hysteria. For you to announce yourself as African or Asian means that you must be Muslim. The kind of stereotyping that goes with it, and the way in which opinion is manufactured and sold. Modern-minded people and citizens everywhere in the world ought to combat that kind of simplification of experience."

Michael Purcaro, director of emergency management for the town of Vernon, was in attendance at the conversation, and asked the panelists how to bring the message to the local communities, including emergency personnel.

Anwar said that the fact that he is a Muslim elected to office in America gives him credibility when he has discussions abroad. "I make sure that I let the world know that before you point fingers at my country, you need to elect people from minority communities in your country, and then you can point fingers at America," he said. "The second part is that our country is the most pluralistic in the world, and in the history of the world. We need to protect that. In my town and across the state, I am a part of educating our police chiefs and police departments… about what the Sikh community is, what the Arab community is, and what the Muslim community is, and we bring a lot of understanding for the first responders, because we want to make sure they are able to take care of people and know the cultural competency that is needed."

Ndibe said the issue of Islamic radicalism, or any radicalism, is something that affects everyone, even if it isn't happening in one's backyard.

"We're talking about violence, especially sectarian violence, and especially driven by a group that is committed to a particular way of life, and that way of life is worth the spilling of the blood of anyone who stands in their way," Ndibe said. "The world has become quite a village, so Americans have quite an interest in Nigeria, and in the West African region, where Boko Haram is growing. American citizens and America's economic and political interests are implicated in the spread of radical Islam. America often becomes a foil for the kind of outrage that we see, because America is seen as a great devil."

Anwar said the issues are important for people in small communities to understand, because globalism is unavoidable. "The world has become a much smaller place," he said. "We are all interlinked. We get news about other parts of the world, and other parts of the world get news about us. In this current, challenging time, radicalization is a concern, and it's happening in every faith. When we look at this factor, we need to start to have open conversations and start to understand. When we understand these things, we actually become more resilient – resilient to survive any challenges, but also to understand what is going on below them."

Ndibe said the key for people to understand is that there are "regional approaches" to solving the problem, and that America's role as leader of the free world is to make sure that the "fires are put out," not as the world's police, but as part of collaborating with countries around the world to make sure that the "threats to our shared humanity do not fester."

"If we remain indifferent to what is happening in Syria and Iraq, then it is going to come to our borders," he said.

Anwar said that the long-term war against radicalism will be one of "hearts and minds."

"We cannot win small battles and lose the bigger war," he said, referring to forceful measures. "All of our military might has caused us to create more enemies. We have to have a broader strategy, and there are far more friends of America than we realize in the world. We have to use the resources we have toward education."

ReminderNews asked Anwar what everyday citizens can do to affect the changes that will hopefully eliminate extremism. "What we can do is make sure that our society and our policy-makers are held accountable for their decisions," he said, "and have the same values and respect each and every human being across the world in the same way we respect ourselves."